Apricots, apricots and more apricots

It turns out the tree in our front yard is an apricot tree. It's a very productive tree too! Over the past 2 weeks, I think we picked ovr 40 lbs of apricots. The crazy thing is that we didn't really do anything special to the tree.

At first I was really excited about being able to pick and eat as many apricots as I pleased. Greg didn't share my enthusiasm, which was fine. Just meant more apricots for me. I soon realized that we have more apricots than I could possibly eat.

So, I started giving them away to friends, family, neighbors and co-workers. I even shared with the squirrels in our neighborhood. (We'd find discarded, half eaten apricots on the ground around the trees in front of our house. And sometimes we'd even see a squirrel dart up our tree and have a picnic in the tree.

We still had a ton of apricots! What was I going to do with all these apricots? A friend suggested that I make jam. And that's exactly what I did today. I made 14-8oz. jars of apricot jam.

It was actually a lot easier than I thought it would be. Sugar, lemon juice, sliced/diced fruit, and pectin...lots of boiling water to sanitize the jars, lids and bands...a little help from Good Eat's Alton Brown...an online recipe...and voila....apricot jam! I felt very "Martha Stewart" as I was making jam in our kitchen. I'm quite impressed with myself and with the jam, even though I haven't tried it yet!

California Academy of Sciences

Last weekend, we went to the California Academy of Sciences with our friends and their 4 year old son. We've been wanting to check it out for a while, so we were pretty excited.

We got tickets for the planetarium show in the morning and the 3D bugs movie in the afternoon. Greg enjoyed a nice nap at the planetarium, which was surprising. Guess he's not that into stars and planets. I really liked the rainforest sphere with all the animals and butterflies. One of the giant butterflies with blue wings landed on my camera lense! And then it quickly flew away. Boo.

The aquarium was a pretty neat too. I think I like the Monterey Bay Aquarium more. Although it's probably not a fair comparsion because the Cal Academy of Sciences is more than an aquarium. We really enjoyed out time there and plan to go back. It's a great place to take kids...even big kids like Greg! Next time we plan to try the pho a the cafe because our friends raved about how good it was, but they didn't have any noodles the day we were there.

You can check out pictures here.

Vegetables!

A couple months ago, we planted two types of tomatoes, crooked-neck squash, eggplant, jalapeno peppers and yellow watermelon in your side yard. We've watched them grow, flower and product fruit. This afternoon, I harvested our first vegetables! We have crooked-neck squash, eggplant and tomatoes.

The tomatoes and squash are growing like crazy. We'll have a tons of those. (Anyone want any?) We'll probably get a few more eggplants. Not sure how many jalapeno peppers we'll get. The peppers are flowering, and you can see stuff growing. Our watermelon's not doing too well, and I'm not sure we'll actually get any fruit.

Now I have to figure out what to make with these veggies!

Being Grateful

I'm not sure if it's human nature or just my nature, but why does it seem like people tend to focus on the negative and the things that we don't have? Maybe it's easier to do that. Or maybe it's because we take the things we do have for granted. Or maybe it's just the American culture of "keeping up with the Jones'. Or maybe it's all of the above.

Lately things at work haven't been too great. When my coworkers or I start to complain about, I've been reminding myself (and them) to put things into perspective and be grateful for the things that I do have.

1. I am employed, which is huge in the current economic climate. I know quite a few people who have been affected by the economic downturn and have lost their jobs. Whenever I talk to them, I'm thankful that I'm not among the ranks of the unemployed.
2. Unlike some of my friends, I haven't had to take a pay cut or take forced time off without pay or a reduction in benefits.
   
3. I have quite a bit of flexibility in my job, which enables me to work from home a few days a week. Not sure if that will continue to be the case after we all move into one building. But for now, it's great!
4. The new company is very dog friendly and quite a few people bring their dogs to work. I brought Tachi to the office a couple weeks ago on a Friday when I didn't have many meetings. He did okay, but whenever I left, he'd get anxious and do his half-bark. It was cool bringing him to work, but I'd prefer to work from home to enjoy spending time with Tachi.
   
5. The new company stocks our kitchen with tons of free food, drinks and snacks. I'm talking about bread, mini-bagels, yogurt, cereal, oatmeal, fresh fruit, english muffins, lunch meat, cheese, peanut butter, jelly, animal crackers, trail mix, mixed nuts, chips and soda. The kitchen gets re-stocked every Tuesday. The funny thing is that it's prettys slim pickings by the time Wednesday afternoon rolls around (the fruit is completely gone by Tuesday evening). I think people are doing their weekly grocery shopping at the company kitchen.
   

So, when I'm having a rough day or feeling sorry for myself, I start repeating the above list of things to be grateful for and amazingly everything seems just a little bit better.

Ch-ch-changes

I am being sold. Well, actually the group I work for at Motorola is being sold. It's kind of a strange feeling being sold. This whole acquisition experience makes me wonder what it would be like to be a woman living in a country where arranged marriages are the norm and the size of your dowry is what really matters.

I have very mixed feelings about this acquisition. On the one hand, it will be nice to get away from big company bureaucracy and process (or lack thereof). Hopefully, we'll be more nimble and responsive. On the other hand, as a smaller, private company I'm a bit concerned about what resources we will and won't have. Either way, I'm going to keep an open mind about what might happen going forward, focus on what I can do, not worry about things I have no control over and just be happy that I am employed.

Catching up on blogging

Wow! I had no idea it's been so long since I posted a blog. We've been so busy with the house, that I haven't much time to write. It's been so long that I wonder if anyone's still reading this blog. =) Let's see...

We finished remodeling our new house in early January and moved in on MLK Jr. weekend. I don't think I want to move for quite some time. We have wonderful friends who helped us move everything. Thanks everyone! We couldn't have done it without you. It took longer to pack everything than to actually move...haha! I suppose that's the way it usually goes. When the last load of "stuff" was unloaded our garage was overflowing. I don't think we could've closed the garage door! Plus the box with our toothbrushes and toiletries were behind a bunch of boxes in the corner of the garage. Anyhoo, it all worked out.

We've unpacked most of the boxes and have found a home for most of our stuff. Even though we've made a lot of progress, there's still a few items that need to find homes or need to be installed (e.g. towel hangers, dining area light, and window coverings) or need to be painted (e.g. master bathroom door and master closet doors). Greg is busy rolling out insulation in the attic as I type. Hopefully, we'll be all settled in by early March.

Christmas 2008

Merry Christmas everyone! We celebrated Christmas with our families. Christmas Eve we drove up to Sacramento to Auntie Doris's house for dinner with Greg's extended family. It was good to see everyone and to meet Seth, Steph and Scott's baby boy. Santa took time out of his busy evening to stop by and hand out a few gifts. I (Cheryl) got to sit on Santa's lap as did Jeanette, Tina, Greg's mom, Auntie Bridget and the kids. I guess Greg and his brothers have already "paid their dues" with sitting on Santa's lap as they grew up.

After filling up on yummy food and homemade blueberry pie (yum!), we headed to Auntie Bridget's house to open gifts. We got lots of Home Depot gift cards, which will come in handy to buy paint for the house! We also got a new dog bed for Tachi, a blender, and a dutch oven. Tachi gave me a lovely fleece-lined, fisherman's knit beanie. Apparently he got a job, as a guard dog, to earn money to buy me the beanie. =) Speaking of Tachi, he got tons of new toys.

My family came over for dinner on Christmas Day. We had hot pot (aka shabu shabu), which is really pretty easy to pull together. Greg had picked up most of the stuff, but I wasn't sure we had enough food. So, I went out to pick up a couple extra packs of sliced meat, veggies, fish balls and tofu. It turns out we would've been fine with what Greg got. Guess we'll have to have hot pot again sometime soon. Anyone want to come over?